Flash Mob Participation Questions

Cafe Society
1

I didn’t want to hijack the “Awesome flash mob scene” by woodstockbirdybird, so I thought I would start this thread. Mods, feel free to move it to GQ or IMHO, if you think it fits better there.

So, let’s say I’m at a mall or public square, just minding my own business, when a flash mob breaks out around me. They are singing something I know, perhaps the “Hallelujah Chorus”. I’ve been in about 10 productions of Handel’s Messiah and know the bass part for all the songs, and can carry a tune, and know how to blend my voice with the person next to me. I even know how to find the conductor, even if the conductor is not out in front waving the baton. (It’s easy … just look at someone who knows what they are doing, and he or she should be looking at the conductor; then, just look in that direction. The stealth conductor is the one directing by nodding his head. Usually. :D) I am especially aware that there is a really long pause right after the four “Hallelujahs” at the end, right before the fifth one.

Should I join in, even if I am not a part of the group that is doing the flash mob?

Now, take the “Ode to Joy” presented in the video linked by woodstockbirdybird. At the beginning, a few people with instruments start joining in. Let’s say I happen to have my instrument with me (perhaps a trumpet, a violin, or perhaps a guitar). I’m an awesome trumpeter, violinist, guitar player, etc. Can I join in?

What if my “instrument” is my fingers? I am really good at whistling through my fingers, and have even put on miniature concerts. If I know a song and it is within my range, I can play it, and can even improvise. Can I join in and contribute my mad whistling skillz to the flash mob?

Now, what if I totally and truly suck at any of those skills. What then?

Flash mobs seem to connote a sense of “everyone join in”, especially Christmas carols at a mall. But is it really good form to join in?

2

To me a flash mob is ‘invitation only’.

if you’re there, feel free to film it and admire it.

Sadly with a musical flash mob, having many random passers-by join in will undoubtedly lower the standard.

3

Hell yes!

4

That flash mob was atypical, at least in my experience. The mobs I’ve seen — one IRL, several more on video — all involved dancing, which means choreography and rehearsals. So no, you can’t just join in. You wouldn’t be able to.

5

That’s not a flash mob. I’m aware that the press has been applying that label to pretty much any noticable thing done in public by a large group of people, but if it’s choreographed and rehearsed, or takes a significant amount of time, it’s more what Improv Anywhere calls an “experiment”.

In a flash mob a large group comes in, does something odd and noticable and then leaves quickly. It lasts less than a minute.

The classic flash mob example was shown on CSI Miami, when a bunch of teenagers swarmed a golf course during a tournament. Each person just ran in, threw a golf ball, and then left, leaving the golfers to try to pick out their balls among hundreds scattered all over the fairway.

The reason it’s called a flash mob is that the whole thing starts and ends in a flash. If you blink, you miss it, and all you see is the aftermath.

6

The first references I saw to flash mobs refered to the fact that, using modern social networks, you can organise and stage a sudden begining to a mob – something that used to have to happen organically, and (in my lifetime) helped by TV coverage.

Like a flash flood, not like a flash of lightning.

I agree with other posters that people who organise dance or choir events, which take lots of training, don’t seem to refer to their own events as “flash” or “mob”.

7

Flash flood:

8

Yeah…

Calling those highly choreographed performances “flash mobs” seems to change the meaning of (what I thought) was the term.

When they first started I thought the whole point of a flash mob was the random participation of people that didn’t neccessarily know each other…something more unplanned and organic.

9

Thanks for the answers, folks!

FWIW, I think the first “flash mob” activity I became aware of was some sort of pillow fight that was advertised over the Internet in some fashion. It may have been in San Francisco, but I could be mis-remembering.

10

The term “flash mob” apparently came from putting together the idea of a “flash crowd” from a 1971 short story of that name by Larry Niven and the idea of “smart mobs” from a 2002 book of that name by Howard Rheingold:

http://www.wordspy.com/words/flashmob.asp

Nobody can stop you from joining a flash mob. There’s a video I watched once. It was probably linked to by an article on Cracked.com. It showed a group that slowly assembled together in some public place. They each started dancing as they joined the group. I guess (but I don’t remember precisely anymore) that there was music playing for them. The group were all students at some college or some such. Some middle-aged guy watching them suddenly decides to join them. It doesn’t bother him that he’s twenty years older than them and not very athletic or well coordinated. He’s obviously having fun and doesn’t remotely care what anyone thinks of him.